By every terrifying measure, America and the world have become far less safe through incoherent, indecisive, and incompetent Biden administration foreign policies and actions.
Eastern and Western Europe
Whereas it's unknowable whether President Vladimir Putin would have invaded Ukraine under a continued Donald Trump presidency, there's little doubt that President Joe Biden's Afghanistan debacle and dithering over early Russian troop and armament border buildups emboldened the catastrophic war action which ensued.
Putin has also exploited NATO weaknesses in the region. Let's recall that Trump had chastised NATO countries which were and continue to be at greatest collateral conflict risk and impact for not paying their fair share to maintain a strong regional defense presence, while U.S. taxpayers shoulder nearly a quarter of those costs.
Biden's war on American fossil energy along with similar disastrous policies in Germany have given Russia an oil and gas stranglehold over much of Western Europe which the U.S. — a net exporter under Trump — is in no longer in a position to resupply.
China, Russia's new world partner, is more than happy to purchase that diverted natural gas which provides economic fuel for Moscow's Ukraine overthrow conquest.
During recent meetings, Russia's Putin and China's Xi Jinping declared a "no-limits friendship" which projected Chinese solidarity with Russia in justifying its Ukraine invasion and expressed a common desire to engage Beijing in brokering a diplomatic settlement to the conflict on terms favorable to Moscow.
Middle East
Beijing is also capitalizing upon Biden's domestic energy destruction and disastrous Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) "nuclear deal" with Tehran to assert economic leverage and leadership dominance throughout the Mideast where China is the biggest trading partner with rapidly expanding investments in infrastructure construction.
Clear evidence of America's diminished regional influence under Biden surfaced on the world stage when the Saudis rejected his desperate plea to increase oil production in order to reduce U.S. pump prices ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.
By contrast, in demonstrating remarkable leadership clout, President Xi hosted a four-day negotiating session in Beijing which led arch rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran to re-establish diplomatic ties that were severed in 2016 — much to the detriment of the Trump-led Abraham Accords and security of our Israeli allies.
As part of the Beijing-bartered agreements, Iran reportedly pledged to halt attacks against Saudi Arabia, including from Houthi rebels it backs in the Yemen civil war, and for Iran, it's about escaping diplomatic isolation imposed by sanctions.
Here, as President Xi seeks to displace the U.S. as preeminent global superpower, he can't do this without Middle Eastern oil, which could be disrupted by an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear weapon enrichment facilities triggering wider regional conflict.
Meanwhile, as the Biden administration has incredulously used Moscow in attempts to broker a return to the failed JCPOA by Tehran, Iran supplies drones to Russia to attack U.S. bases in Syria and Ukraine populations we defend with military and humanitarian supplies.
Latin America
Beijing is also expanding economic relationships with Venezuela, Argentina and Brazil as a consequence of a new wave of leftist leaders who have swept into office across Latin America in recent years.
China is considered Brazil's largest trading partner, and both are members of an economic organization called BRICS also consisting of Russia, India, and South America.
Brazil has agreed to conduct future China trade in yuan currency, and provocatively to America, allowed Irani warships to moor off Rio de Janeiro's famous beaches from Feb. 26 to March 4.
In another ominous development, Honduras has recently established diplomatic relations with China which formally cut ties with Taiwan.
Taiwan, South China Sea
All of the foregoing conspires to raise wonderment regarding if and when Beijing will exploit Biden domestic and foreign policy weaknesses to launch a military conquest of Taiwan and American allies in the South China Sea region.
Remember, for example, that Taiwan is the world's largest producer of advanced computer chips needed for all those myriad devices we import from China sweatshop supply chains.
Chinese buildups and recent military drills around Taiwan evidence serious preparations for war.
And while the Russia-Ukraine conflict rapidly depletes our munitions supplies, the aforementioned Beijing-Moscow alliance now combines its formidable nuclear weapons inventories to bolster China's world- largest naval fleet and standing army as our inflation-ravaged military budgets decline.
Africa
In March, President Xi traveled to the African Republic of Congo, where China is its biggest trading partner — stating that he wants to raise ties "to a new and higher level."
It's prudent to note here that Congo is the world's largest producer of cobalt that will be required— along with other rare earth minerals China currently monopolizes — for myriad domestic and military devices including those countless electric vehicle batteries that the Biden administration is pushing on already stressed U.S. power grids.
On perhaps a lighter note, the Biden White House dispatched Vice President Kamala Harris to Africa in March to shore up relationships and "counter Beijing's influence on the continent."
President Xi must have been laughing uncontrollably right along with her.
Larry Bell is an endowed professor of space architecture at the University of Houston where he founded the Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture and the graduate space architecture program. His latest of 12 books is "Architectures Beyond Boxes and Boundaries: My Life By Design" (2022). Read Larry Bell's Reports — More Here.